The Blog at Pooh Corner

There is a question which ebbs and flows throughout the pages of this parenting and blogging community: What, exactly, are the consequences to the actions we now take? It has been addressed before, and chances are that it will be addressed again. That, of course, is the nature of the tide.

Some of us talk openly of our children. Some of us hide their identity. We share photos or we don’t. We tell tales and we change the names of those involved, or we out them with open and festive embrace. These are choices made on a personal level, but the results of those choices are anything but private. In this age of the Internets our children are exposed as never before, and more often than not it is the loving hand of the parent pushing them onward. We feed the fears we are unfolding.

I suppose that most of us falling within the label of “Parent Blogger” have done so for similar reasons. Namely, we love our children. We are proud of them. We are excited about them. A generation ago we would have shown photos over water coolers attempting to pique the interest of those around us. This forum, the blog, this is our water cooler. We were pulled here from places far and thrown together for subjects dear. This is not a community built on the exploitation of children. This is a community built on love. We are proud. We are a pride.

Ours is the result of technological advances, but the concept is not new. Roughly 90 years ago A.A. Milne wrote the stories of his son Christopher Robin and published them for the world to read. They were full of tender brilliance and exceptional wonder.

The stories brought a father and son closer together. The stories brought them joy.

And it was short-lived.

The father soon found himself unable to be taken for anything other than a writer of children’s stories, and it frustrated him for the rest of his life.

The son soon outgrew the shadows of youth forever captured in the books of his father. He went from enjoying the fame of his character to being haunted by it. He grew bitter and distant. Then, father and son grew apart, which is not the most uncommon thing to happen among grown men, but it is among the most undesirable.

The world of kindness they had created together took every ounce of it that they had between them, and then it cast them out to battle the demons that remained.

No parent wants to be resented by their offspring. It is hard enough to lose their hugs and dependence, but to alienate them by actions of your own hand—words of love— that cannot taste anything but sour.

Christopher Robin grew up to marry his first cousin. He rarely visited his father and after Milne’s death the son never returned to visit his mother for her remaining 15 years. What darkness must have filled him when his shadows were left behind?

Are we too creating worlds of words that will one day cause more heartache than the joy we now feel? By putting our own children on a stage viewed by an endless audience are we providing the fodder of therapy sessions and fostering acts of rebellion?

I hope not. I hope we are raising a generation able to accept and understand, even appreciate what we do. Isn’t that the reason that many of us first started this journey to begin with, to leave pieces of us behind that forever showcase our love and our happiness? We are able to offer a rare glimpse into memories otherwise forgotten—isn’t that alone enough to chance what we share?

I am faced with my own mortality, now more than ever, and I want the world to know me at what is surely my finest hour, these days when the boys are young and I am years from older.

Raising a child in the age of the blog offers us each the opportunity to write our own stories. This is mine, and it is layered in love and lessons, but how it ends remains to be seen.

For now, the pages continue to turn, and I do not want my children to outgrow their playthings, just as I know they must. I can only hope that when that day comes they understand that which I have done, and know it for the love that it is. It is their innocence running free through the fields of eternity, and an endless invitation to try and catch it.

__________

So they went off together. But wherever they go, and whatever happens to them on the way, in that enchanted place on the top of the Forest, a little boy and his Bear will always be playing.

– A.A. Milne, The House at Pooh Corner

Illustrations by E.H. Shepard; an early version of this post first appeared on DadCentric

22 Responses to "The Blog at Pooh Corner"

This is really intriguing. I didn’t know all of that about Milne. I wonder a lot about parent blogging. I usually end up deciding that outcomes will vary based on the type of parent the writer was, not what they blogged or didn’t blog. If a parent-child relationship was fundamentally good, then the blogged parts of a child’s life will feel like lovely artifacts. If the parent-child relationship overall was a narcissistic, abusive, unaccepting, problematic, challenged– then the blogged content may end up feeling painful, intrusive, regretful. No one can know. Teens who struggle usually don’t show signs of those struggles early on, and parents with issues are usually the last to know, especially narcissists! But mostly, people are okay so their blogging should be okay, right? Interesting to think about.

I agree with all of that, Deb, and yet I cannot think of anything more beautiful than the stories Milne created for his son. I’m going to keep doing what I do, because I believe in it, and I trust my boys will receive it well, but you’re right, it’s pretty interesting.

I think we all wish this, whether lived and transcribed on pages and monitors, or played out at ball fields and dinner tables. Your pause is generous and sincere, selfishly I hope it doesn’t change, then again, your writing is beautiful whenever it is fueled by things and people you love.

“How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard.”Amanda´s last blog post ..Just Perfect

I’m currently reading The House at Pooh Corner to my boys at night, and the beauty, melancholy, and love of it all is just too much in the best way possible, and yet knowing what I do it breaks my heart.

My grandfather insisted on being buried with his copy. It all is so very dear to me. This, as I said, was lovely and worthy of the relationship to that love story.Amanda´s last blog post ..Just Perfect

I think about the long term effect of my writing quite often. I have many stories that lay dormant because I pulled my finger away from publishing. Hopefully my kids will look at the things I wrote about them and realize that everything I did and said was become I love them. And they’ll get a little insight into my feelings and thoughts during the moments that we had.

You’re a good dude. We’re all navigating this digital age – with it has come some great things (like being able to reach a worldwide audience) and some scary stuff (like being able to instantly reach a worldwide audience and not be able to take back something you may have reconsidered later). But you’ll figure it all out. You’re a good dude.Zach Rosenberg´s last blog post ..9 Tips for Taking Your Kid to Their First Comic-Con

As my daughter gets older, I think more and more about this stuff that you’ve put so thoughtfully. In the end, I think we need these tensions, these fears, to keep making us thoughtful about the things we produce, to keep making us thoughtful about the ways we perceive our kids and the ways we allow them to be perceived.

I also think that whether we blog or not, kids will become enmeshed in the world of social media. Blogs are probably the least of their worries. Perhaps the writings we produce can serve as an example of the right ways to interact with it, the right ways to send things out to the world, when so many young people flounder while trying to find their way.neal´s last blog post ..Revenge of the Fifth

We can’t know what shadows lurking behind Milne’s lovely prose and I can’t place the origin of this father and son separation. But if we take advantage of our children, and their stories, we run the risk of violating the very reason we began journaling.

I don’t know that I can predict the future in these cases. I guess we could abstain from the practice entirely, if we preferred. But I think the wisest thing we can do is manage each moment and examine whether or not we’re being true. I trust my sons will find value in my stories. If they don’t, then I’ll have passed the time recording my love and struggle with them.

Wow, Whit. Amazing piece. I often wonder what my kids will think in the future. I’m going to echo what Carter said, and hope they recognize the love by which the writing is created.Creed Anthony´s last blog post ..What Makes Moms Special?

This just blew my mind… I mean, I sincerely think way too much already, and you may have taken me from semi-paranoid to full fetched paranoia.

All jokes aside though, I really enjoyed reading this. And I can see where you’re coming from.

However, maybe we don’t need to worry so much. Maybe we’re already so engulfed in this “look at me” lifestyle with twitter, and instagram becoming technology of the past, and now children are attaching themselves to things like Blogr, Media, ki, and whatever else is out there that we don’t know of.

The difference is, we’re GLORIFYING our kids (and essentially ourselves) and they’re destroying their own images(complete blanket statement). Where we’re reading and writing about getting their drivers license and first car accidents, they’re posting about see through bikinis, and “ragers.” Smoking, and ditching school… sex and rock and roll…. (again… complete blanket statement)

See what I’m saying here?

I think that with this “blog thing” being so socially widespread, it makes the situation different than a man publishing books during a time when it was hard to get your voice heard.

This rocks. Thank you. I started my blog while I was pregnant with my daughter as a way for me to chronicle our life. While I don’t write much, I am excited for her to one day ready about our life together.

Thought-provoking and brutally honest. What I’m about to write isn’t meant to be a defense of bloggers, blogging or writing about family life. But as I was reading your description of the father-son relationship, I kept going back and visualizing Milne family dinners, conversations, family dynamics and thinking that it can’t be all about the stories.

Think for a moment on what family life must have been like with a writer during that age/time/era who was pigeon-holed into a personally frustrating genre. What would that have been like for his family? What in their family life would happen to drive such a deep wedge? I can’t think it was the entirely the stories of a boy and his bear. I’m thinking about mental health, frustrated creative minds and money. And those avenues lead to more questions. What kind of parent was the boy’s father? To not speak to your mother for 15 years? Some shit went down, is what I’m saying. Maybe it was about inheritance. Maybe it was abuse. Maybe there were mental health issues and not just from the parents. Maybe there was a need to listen and apologize and resolve and it just wasn’t going to happen. I think the answers to those questions and the maybes would speak far more to the deterioration of a family than some literary work.

We speak so differently today. To each other, to our children, to the children of others. We are encouraged to talk about our feelings. We are encouraged to listen. We are encouraged to ask ourselves hard questions about why we do certain things and what from our past motivates us. We are encouraged to be better parents than ours were to us.

We live in an age where the conversation we have with ourselves and our readers is discussed in ways that are far different than society in the 19th century.

I’m willing to bet A.A. Milne never said anything to his son as beautiful as:

“I can only hope that when that day comes they understand that which I have done, and know it for the love that it is. It is their innocence running free through the fields of eternity, and an endless invitation to try and catch it.”

Your boys are lucky to have you as their father. Damn lucky.Jon Armstrong´s last blog post ..Candy Chandelier

Whit, this is so fascinating. I did not know this story at all; it makes my heart hurt (but in a good, you should know this sort of way).

More generally, this is an issue I think about all the time, not only from my own decisions about what to share/not share, but as I view the copious sharings of others online (some of which make me cringe, admittedly). When I wrote my book, my husband and I experienced (major) conflict over some of the anecdotes I shared about my daughters (and him). To me, they were lessons that ultimately had a positive outcome but it’s true, I was telling a narrative that wasn’t just about me. That hit me when one of Laurel’s friends said to her, “Hey, I read about you in your mom’s book.” and I was immediately like, “SHIT.”